


Leave a tender moment alone

by imsfire



Series: Ten songs, ten stories [10]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Angst and Feels, Cassian isn't much better, F/M, Jyn is not good with words, Pining, Somebody Lives/Not Everyone Dies, and neither of them is good at emotions, but they fumble and feel their way, finally admitting to feelings, honestly these two are hopeless, trying to express oneself, wanting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-03
Updated: 2017-12-03
Packaged: 2019-02-10 06:48:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12906423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imsfire/pseuds/imsfire
Summary: Cassian spends so much of his life being articulate; professionally, calmly fluent, telling lies and selling stories.  But now and here, when the tale to be told is the truth of his heart, and there can be no words but his, those words vanish like smoke...





	Leave a tender moment alone

When he wakes, Jyn is standing over the bunk, looking down at him. 

Is it his shift again, already?  He peers at his chrono; there’s still an hour to go, but she must have woken him for some reason.  Cassian rubs a hand over his face and sits up slowly.  Reaches under the bed for his boots.

“You don’t have to get up yet.”

“Uh...  What is it, then?”

“Nothing…”

“Jyn, you were watching me.  Like, watching over me.  What is it?”

“Nothing,” she says again in a voice like a wall of bruised stone.  “I – I was just – I wasn’t –“  Then very slowly “Krif.  I’m sorry.  I’m not – you know –“

“Not?”

“You know.  Good with words.  Verbal.”

Cassian sighs, looks down at the grimy boots in the dim light of the cabin.  If she only knew…

He spends so much of his life being articulate; professionally, calmly fluent, telling lies and selling stories.  But now and here, when the tale to be told is the truth of his heart, and there can be no words but his, those words vanish like smoke.

“Me neither,” he remarks after a long moment of failing to speak.

“You’re okay at it.  I’ve heard you make a proper speech.”  Jyn sounds half-accusing, half-reassuring. 

He glances up at her from under his lashes.  “And I’ve heard you do the same.  A _good_ speech.”

“That was then,” she says uncomfortably.  Her face shuts.  “It was – different.”

He didn’t mean to, but somehow he’s pushed her back, again.  He wishes he knew what it is she’s ill-at-ease with.  Is it the cause, the situation, her new role, is it being stuck in this confined shuttle with him and the ever-more sarcastic K2?  Is it, simply, him?

He doesn’t, he daren’t, ask.  Her eyes have such a naked fire in them, and her face around them is held in such fearful cold.  Is she angry, resentful, afraid?  Wishing herself anywhere but here?  Or just wishing he’d shut up his tactless mouth for once?

He wants to hold her again, has wanted to ever since the med-bay on Yavin 4; and he wants to fall at her feet, in gratitude and in expiation, and somehow to show her it was all worth it, that the work they are doing is bearing fruit and honouring the dead as they would have wished to be honoured.  He wants to beg her to hope with him that maybe they will both live to see the peace.

“I want,” he says; and then can’t say anymore.

He wants.  He wishes.

He sighs.

“What do you want, Cassian?”

The question is very quiet.  Jyn reins herself in so hard when she’s uncertain of anything; her expression, even her breathing, tightly contained.

Cassian shakes his head.  “I – so much – I want –“ He swallows the words unuttered.  How can it be any good for her to hear these things? She wants freedom, not more burdens of guilt.  Leave it, leave it…

“Me too,” she murmurs, in a voice so small that he looks up in disbelief.  He can’t have heard that right.  Can he?

She’s looking down at him where he sits on the edge of his bunk, and the fire he sees isn’t the usual furious blaze but something naked and frail.  Not a supernova in her soul but a candle flame, tonight.  As he lifts his head he can feel a tiny helpless quivering in himself and he wonders if it’s visible.  Can she see how he’s quaking, looking up at her, all delicate light and indomitability, a beacon in his life?

Her eyes are on his; and then suddenly she says “Hold on, you – you’ve –“ and her left hand comes up, touches his cheek, tilts his head into the light.  “Hold still –“

He gasps as a fingertip brushes his temple, moving down and in, almost to the corner of his eye and then out again.  It takes all his strength not to lean into her touch.

“There.  All gone.”  Her hand lingers for a second and he blinks at her.  Hastily she says “Eyelash – it would’ve –“ - but the gentle touch is still on his cheek and her face is suddenly almost terrifyingly vulnerable as she looks down at him.  She’s wide open; the realisation hits him like a shot through the brain, the clarity of an end game.  She isn’t hiding anymore; and he can do the same. 

He gasps for a breath, makes himself try to speak.

“Jyn, I – I want – I _need_ –“

She swallows and does not look away.  Nothing left but touch, now, words falling to dust and silence. 

Cassian closes his eyes and lets himself lean forward.  She’s standing right in front of him where he sits on the bunk bed, and he leans into her hand, into the smell of rain and laundry soap, blasters and antiperspirant, and an indefinable undernote that is salt and musk and her; into the clumsy caress that gentles and grows sure, at last, and draws him in, and holds him.  His brow comes to rest between her breasts, he can feel her sternum against his nose, and the warmth of the skin at her open collar. 

The first kiss, on the crown of his head, is a tender pressure; a second later her mouth brushes the edge of his hairline.  Warm lips, speaking without speech, at last.

His answering kiss, pressed into the V of exposed skin in the neckline of her shirt.  She inhales, exhales, and he does the same, and without a word their arms come up and hold one another close.  At last, at last, at last.


End file.
